Transcript of "What isliterature"

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What is “Literature”?In the last 50 years, the very meaning of“Literature” and “reading” and“criticism” has undergone deepalteration

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Literature:Traditionally,literature is“imaginative”writing---writingwhich is not literallytrueHOWEVER: thedistinction between“real” and “fake” or“fact” and “fiction”isn’t always a gooddistinction; manyclassical works werenon-fiction

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What do we mean when we saysomething is “Literary”?“Some texts are born literary, someachieve literariness, and some haveliterariness thrust upon them.”

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Is literature dictated bycontext?I’m your teacher. I have several collegedegrees. If I tell you it’s LITERATURE,am I to be believed?Many works of “literature” that we studyin college were constructed to BEliterature, but many were not.

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When “Language” is the onlycriteria of “literary”, what typesof texts are ignored?Should these types of texts beignored? Why? Why Not?

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The problem with language. . .“The idea that there is a single, ‘normal’language, a common currency shared equallyby all members of society, is an illusion. Anyactual language consists of a highly complexrange of discourses, differentiated according toclass, region, gender, status and so on, whichcan by no means be neatly unified into a singlehomogeneous linguistic community.”--Terry Eagleton, literary critic and scholar

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Literature is SubjectiveSince the 1980’s, the “literary canon” ofworks--a group of works “agreed upon”to be “the best” by well-known scholarsand critics, has been disputed

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Why do you think the “canon”was disputed?And who forwarded the charge ofdispute?

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The “Canon” excluded mostworks that were not by white,European malesWorks of literature by women,homosexuals, and works byindividuals of varied races, classesand ethnicities were marginalized

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How did this happen?There are many ways of “writing”--butthose in power recognized only one,formal way of “writing,” and this wasgiven the higher valueThus, the literary “canon” is a construct;it was fashioned by particular people forparticular reasons at a particular time.

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There is no literary work ortradition that has value in and ofitselfEven Shakespeare!

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In his era, Shakespeare wasregarded as a hack!It’s true! Time and circumstance hasoffered the value to particular texts; andthis “value” is a transitive term--it willchange as the people in power changeand are altered, and according to thecontext of the reading of a particular text.

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Revisioning the Canon:All “literary” works areunconsciously rewritten by thesocieties that read them.

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Context:Readers interpret literary works in thelight of their own concernsReaders interpret literary works in thelight of a given circumstanceReaders interpret literary works in thelight of a given time period

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Multi-cultural and Multi-ethnicLiteraturesUniquely situated toview under thisbroader banner ofwho I am and whereI’m from, and howthese thingscontribute to what IwriteYOU are invited tocontextualizeyourself as well--whoYOU are and in whatcontext you’rereading these texts inorder to understandhow you ‘read’ aparticular text

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So: WHAT IS LITERATURE?What constitutes a “literary” text?What qualities will help me todetermine the ‘literariness’of a text?